I love documentaries. I'm particularly fond of documentaries about true crime (art fraud and serial crimes), cults, music documentaries, and weird one-off films about unusual subjects (think Worn Stories on Netflix). I can't help it when it comes to true crime and cults. If you haven't watched or read I'll Be Gone in the Dark (HBOMax), I highly recommend it. The book was one of the best true crime books I've read and the series was incredibly well done. Michelle McNamara was a true talent.
Since last Sunday, I've watched four documentaries about disaster music festivals. Yes, I finally watched the two Fyre festival documentaries, but I started with the disaster that was Woodstock 99 (also two docs about it). I've been talking about the Woodstock 99 documentaries all week; I can't help myself. There is so much wrong with both events, but at the heart of both is greed and the egos of mediocre, white men. As someone who is an organizer and project manager, I cannot sit with the idea that so much of both disaster events could have been avoided when actual planning and listening to people when problems were identified. As a woman who goes to a lot of concerts and festivals, I'm angry about the casual way in which the two main organizers of Woodstock 99 talked about the assaults and rapes like they didn't happen or if they did, the women were at fault. Both of those dudes can fuck right off as far as I'm concerned (yes, I know one has passed away - he can still fuck off). My brain hurts.
None of this week's entries were in direct response to what I watched, but I can't say I'm not influenced by the media I consume when I embroider. Maybe I was trying to bring some calm to the chaos of all that I watched. I don't really know. I also went to a concert on Wednesday (The Decemberists) and have an idea for a piece based on the Queen from The Hazards of Love album. This is my favorite Decemberists album (The Crane Wife and Picaresque round out my top three) and the Queen is my favorite character. More to come as this idea winds its way through my brain. Will I eventually create something about either of the festivals? Probably not...unless my friends are comfortable with me turning our text chain about these documentaries into some sort of journal of anger.
I stayed under 10 minutes every day this week. I'm proud of this accomplishment (longest entry was 6 minutes, 38 seconds on Thursday).
This week's recap:
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| August 21: Detached fly stitches look like birds or bats. |
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| August 22: I'm considering doing next year's stitch journal with only chain stitches (and variations of the chain stitch). |
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| August 23: More chain stitch - I love how it looks around the French knots. |
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| August 24: I'm always on the fence about split stitch, but it works here. |
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| August 25: I don't have a lot of Perle thread left in the ort jar, so I used what was left for a little rainbow. |
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| August 26: I used six strand variegated thread for these back stitches. It's rare that I have a full strand of six threads since I primarily worked with two and three strands last year. I feel sort of decadent when I use all six strands for something in the journal. |
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| August 27: another line of back stitches. I found what was probably the end of a skein of thread in the pink ort jar container, cut it in half and used two sections of three strands to get this line. I have the other half saved for another day. |
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| Will I be able to get through October on only this section of the fabric? I have an idea for November and December if I can stay here for the next two months and four days. |
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| I'm going to have to start using the neutrals bin a lot more. I still think I'll make it to the end of the year with the thread I have, but have two other ort jars (from 2020 and to date for this year) that I can use if I need more thread. |
I haven't worked on much else this week, but I did get one more layer of Spider Tree on the paper and did a little painting in my art journal.
If you decide to watch any/all of these documentaries and want to talk about them for what is probably an unhealthy amount of time, let me know. I have so many feelings about the Woodstock 99 disaster, mostly around the violence of white men and the casual dismissal of women's voices around abuse. The Fyre Festival...happened. The lesson in all of these films is that the (white) men are not alright. Prepare to be angry over the course of nine hours (approximate) if you watch all four.
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